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The additional difficulties in cultivation, however, provided little to no benefit. While gathering qi for regular use became easier and faster with more practice and a higher cultivation, gathering enough for a breakthrough was extremely difficult after stagnation began setting in when I turned 60.

Elder Tian had fulfilled our agreement, providing me with five Fire Dragon’s Tongue Fruits. Using them as the main ingredient, I was able to concoct five Rank 3 Fire Affinity Boosting Pills. The effect of those pills didn’t last long, so I could only use them at a critical moment during each breakthrough, but they provided just enough of a boost to allow me to continue advancing.

At age 80, my cultivation base was deep into stagnation and was only a decade from true calcification. I was a Martial Grandmaster 9, and advancement felt nearly impossible, but after nearly another full decade of hard work, I was finally able to push myself to Martial Grandmaster Peak.

A few years after that, at age 92, I had accomplished nearly everything I would in this life. I was ready for what came next.

I estimated there was only one month or so before the deadly attack on the Su Clan, so I began using my agreement with the Tigers as a pretext to get into contact with more people from that faction.

Ever since I connected TianLei with the Tigers, I had assumed that the attack would be some type of coordinated effort from the entire faction, so I talked to many of the members regularly, trying to tease out any information I could about their future plans.

I heard a lot from them about how the Su Clan had been oppressing them, and since it was generally assumed that I was a discarded member of the clan, they felt free to share their grievances with me. Everyone was willing to tell me how much they hated the Su Clan, but at no point did anybody even hint at an imminent plan to take revenge.

I continued probing for information for several weeks, but one week before I expected the attack to take place, Elder Tian came to see me.

After a series of pleasantries, he got to his reason for visiting me.

“Deacon Su,” he said, “you’ve been in the sect now for nearly 80 years. Do you remember much about your life before you came here?”

Knowing that he was about to launch a full-scale attack against the clan, my mind raced, trying to figure out how I should handle this conversation. “A little, elder,” I said. “Why do you ask?”

“Were you a member of the Su Clan?” he asked bluntly.

“No, elder, not exactly,” I said. “My father was, but he was expelled from the clan when he was young. He died when I was eight years old, but before that, he did tell me a little about them. I don’t remember much, only that he had a deep grudge against them.”

After speaking, I realized that my answer might sound suspicious, but I could only rely on him having no idea that I knew he would attack the clan soon. Without that knowledge, he shouldn’t have any reason to suspect me of anything.

“And what are your thoughts about the Su Clan?” he asked.

“I don’t have much knowledge of them, elder,” I said, “but based on what other disciples have told me, they seem extremely tyrannical.”

“Yes.” He nodded. “They have been suppressing the other nobles in the Wastes for a long time now, but that should end soon.”

He seemed to hesitate about whether or not he should say more, but in the end, he must have decided against it.

“Thank you for your time, deacon. We’ll talk more in the future.”

I wasn’t sure if he had been deciding to eliminate me or trying to decide whether to recruit me, but it didn’t matter. I didn’t want to have any part in his plot. I already knew what was going to happen, and now I had a pretty good understanding of why. The only things left to know were more about how the attack would take place and what the aftermath would be.

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The best place for me was watching from the sidelines.

The next week was very quiet. I expected the lead-up to the attack would see a lot of activity within and around the sect, but to my surprise, everything was completely normal.

It wasn’t until the morning of the eighth day after that last discussion that a servant disciple came to my house and informed me that I was required to attend a meeting in the Grand Hall, the building where I received my promotion to deacon. The meeting would be in two hours, giving messengers enough time to inform all the deacons and elders.

That morning, the mountain was unusually subdued. There were no disciples out and about studying or worrying about concocting their next pill. It seemed that either everyone had been informed of what happened at the Su Clan or they could sense the tense atmosphere. While nobody had come to tell me about it, I did not doubt that others would be able to get at least some information from their faction.

I joined a long line of deacons and elders as I made my way to the Grand Hall. Before, I didn’t realize how many of us there were, but dozens of Grandmasters surrounded me as I walked up the mountain.

At the hall, we did not go into the side door that I had used previously. Everyone went in through the main entrance. Inside was a sunken amphitheater with rows of seating in a horseshoe shape with the elders seated in the lowest level, inner sect deacons in the middle levels, and outer sect deacons in the top levels. All the seats faced a dais in the middle of the room with three ornate chairs, the middle of which was sitting atop a pedestal.

After the elders and deacons were all seated, three men walked in from behind the dais and sat upon the chairs. The left chair was taken by Deputy Sect Master Tan, the head of the Alchemy Peak. I didn’t recognize the other two, but it was easy enough to guess that the man on the right was the Deputy Sect Master in charge of the Martial Peak. The man in the middle had to be the Master of the Twin Mountains Sect.

After they were seated, Sect Master Tan began to speak. “As you may have heard, the Su Clan has been attacked. What we know so far points to this being an internal coup. However, four people have been identified as outside accomplices.”

At these words, everyone became serious. No one seemed surprised, but everyone understood the gravity of this situation.

The head of the Martial Peak began speaking. “All Su Clan buildings in Dragon Gate City have been obliterated. Both their palace compound and their training complex have been demolished, and from what we can tell, everyone inside has perished. All that remains are open fields of scorched and blackened earth."

Then, the Sect Master spoke. “This is a complete violation of the accords which govern the Wastes. The Flowing Mountain Sect, Verdant Forest Sect, and Rising Sun Empire will all be sending forces to investigate and punish the perpetrators. The Blue Wind Pavilion, as arbiter of the accords, will have direct authority over all those involved. Investigators will enter the sect. Do nothing to impede them and keep all disciples on a short leash.”

Murmurs of discontent started when the idea of outside investigators having what seemed to be free rein in the sect was mentioned.

Emboldened by the people around him, one of the outer sect deacons stood up. “We can’t allow this!” he shouted. “We can handle our own investigations. Send any outsiders away.”

“Quiet!” yelled the Sect Master. “If anyone tries to block the investigation in any way, they will be killed. This is not a joke. The very existence of this sect and the lives of everyone here are at stake. If anything goes wrong, no one will be able to escape execution.”

As fear began to fill the room, Sect Master Tan spoke up again. “We have met with leaders from all the factions and are confident that none of them were involved in the attack. While we have not spoken to all the independent elders, we have no reason to suspect any of them were involved either. Our sect is uninvolved in this tragedy, so there is no reason to worry. Just cooperate with the investigators and provide them any assistance they need in tracking down the culprits.”

Finally, the Sect Master spoke. “Until this situation has been resolved, we must seal the mountain. No one is allowed in or out without express permission of one of the Sect Masters, and any such traffic will be recorded and reported to the investigation team. Dismissed.”

There was a semblance of normalcy for the next several days, but that ended abruptly when the investigators arrived. Over four dozen Peak Grandmasters swarmed the sect looking for any information about the attack. I did my best to keep a low profile. I had most of what they wanted to know, and if I was interrogated, I wasn’t sure I would be able to hide it. I wanted to see what happened without me affecting the results, though, so I did my best to avoid being questioned.

The focus of the investigation was fire. The Su Clan had been turned into a smoldering wreck, and that meant powerful fire qi users or people with potent fire blessings.

Typically, the sect didn’t inquire about people’s blessings or affinities. The methods used for selecting disciples were purely sink or swim. If you were good enough at alchemy, or you were a strong enough fighter, you could push through the nominal disciple areas and join the sect. However, during this investigation period, everyone was required to report both their blessing and fire affinity, and blessings had to be demonstrated.

I recorded my blessing as my fire seed. At this point, it was public enough that I wouldn’t be able to hide it from an investigation. It might make me a target of greed, but I wasn’t worried about it implicating me in the attack. Cold Mountain Fire couldn’t cause the kind of destruction that was reported, it wouldn’t scorch the earth, so it shouldn’t make me a suspect, and if someone just got greedy, I could always pop a poison pill to escape.

I was questioned a couple of times, but everything they asked was basic. I was in the sect during the attack, and that would have been easy enough to verify. If they believed I was connected with any suspects, there was no sign of it during questioning.

Since I was keeping my distance, I didn’t know what the investigators found or didn’t find, but after a week of searching they all left the sect. Everyone was shaken by the experience. It showed us exactly what our place was in the world. If outsiders decided we needed to be searched, we would be searched, and there wasn’t a thing we could do to stop them.

As the days passed, things slowly returned to normal.